506 The Water-fowl Family 



only way to get good wing shooting was to have 

 some one go about with a boat or horse and keep 

 the birds in motion where the pond was so large 

 that the game would not leave it. If the ponds 

 were small, then it was necessary to drive them 

 from one to another and hide along the line of 

 flight. Where they were mere beads upon a 

 slough this often made very fine shooting, but 

 where they were solitary ponds the birds simply 

 went to another and resumed dozing in the sun 

 until roused again. The consequence was that 

 good flight shooting was not to be had every- 

 where or every day, even where ducks were most 

 plenty. And nowhere have I seen or heard of 

 such pass shooting as I used to enjoy in Illinois, 

 Minnesota, and Wisconsin in the sixties. In 

 places there is fine flight shooting for a time, and 

 there has been night shooting surpassing that of 

 any other section, but in proportion to the num- 

 ber of ducks I believe that what we used to 

 call first-class duck-shooting has been rarer on 

 this coast than on the great flyways of the Mis- 

 sissippi watershed. The best of that shooting used 

 to be without any decoys, which were used very 

 little except in spring. But here in many places 

 decoys seem necessary in autumn, though there 

 are other spots where they are not. On the great 

 prairies it was a certainty that thousands of the 

 great travelling host from above would alight in 



